Danilo Udovički-Selb. Soviet Architectural Avant-Gardes: Architecture and Stalin’s Revolution from Above, 1928-1938. London: Bloomsbury Visual Arts, 2020. Illustrations. 264 pp. $115.00, cloth, ISBN 978-1-4742-9986-2. Reviewed by Liana Battsaligova (Yale University) Published on H-SHERA (June, 2021) Commissioned by Hanna Chuchvaha (University of Calgary) Architecturally speaking, one would be hard- Udovički-Selb intends not to provide a cata‐ pressed to find two buildings that differ more logue of all buildings imagined and built in the drastically than the main building of Moscow 1930s but rather to “bring to light important ex‐ State University (the alleged symbol of Stalinist ar‐ amples that can support the claim of a strong pres‐ chitecture) and a khrushchevka (the standardized ence of modern architecture” at the time (p. 3). multifamily housing introduced under Nikita Throughout the book, the author insists that mod‐ Khrushchev). Yet both buildings belong to the same ernist architecture and avant-garde movements “architectural method,” even if only ideologically. coexisted with “proletarian architecture,” a vague [1] Such a paradox reflects the tumultuous history term used to indicate new constructions that of the term “socialist realism” in architecture, the answered the immediate demands of proletarian main style and artistic method to be adopted by revolution. In 1932, the term “proletarian architec‐ Soviet architects following the example of Soviet ture” was replaced by the equally ambiguous desig‐ writers and artists. In Soviet Architectural Avant- nation of “socialist realism.” The author creates an Gardes: Architecture and Stalin’s Revolution from intricate map of architectural thought which chal‐ Above, 1928-1938, Danilo Udovički-Selb counters lenges the widely accepted belief that 1932 signaled reductionist analyses of the period as conservat‐ the death of the architectural avant-garde and the ive, revivalist, largely historicist, or totalitarian, all-encompassing conservative turn in Soviet ar‐ and instead offers a more nuanced and complex chitecture. The author traces the chronological reading of the modernist architectural forms that chain of political and public events that framed were incorporated into the eclectic silhouette of the last, yet active, decade of the second genera‐ socialist realist architecture, even finding their tion of constructivists, while inlaying the narrative way into the “historicist” forms of Stalinist archi‐ with individual cameos of legendary figures, such tecture of the 1940-50s. as architects Ivan Leonidov and Konstantin Mel‐ H-Net Reviews nikov, and offering detailed and eloquent readings the architect could articulate the socialist meaning of their projects. of his project. Moisei Ginzburg’s highly praised pro‐ The first chapter opens with an innovative in‐ ject for the Sanatorium of People’s Commissariat vestigation of the role played by the Vsesoiuznoe of Heavy Industry in Kislovodsk (finished in 1937) obshchestvo proletarskikh arkhitektorov (All-Uni‐ is one example. With time, the ambiguous term on Society of Proletarian Architects, VOPRA), cre‐ “socialist realism” in Soviet architecture became ated in 1929 by Lazar Kaganovich, Joseph Stalin’s associated with historicism and classicism. Yet closest ally in the Politburo at the time, in the dis‐ Udovički-Selb compellingly argues (and here he solution of the constructivists’ main journal, echoes the ideas of Selim O. Khan-Magomedov and Sovremennaia arkhitektura (Contemporary archi‐ Vladimir Paperny) that in the 1930s, socialist real‐ tecture, 1926-30); the closing of Vysshie ism as imagined by Stalin was embodied in Arkadii khudozhestvenno-tekhnicheskie masterskie (High‐ Langman’s sober modernist aesthetics of the build‐ er Art and Technical Studios, VKhUTEMAS); and ing for the Gosudarstvennyi planovyi komitet (the the character assassinations of several modernist State Planning Committee, GOSPLAN; the building architects. Through a detailed analysis of reports was finished in 1935 and today houses the Russian of secret party meetings, Udovički-Selb shows how Duma) and in Kazimir Malevich’s arkhitektons VOPRA acted as a “Trojan horse amidst the Avant- and the “power and stability” of American sky‐ Gardes”; through the vulgar polemics and empty scrapers as shown in Boris Iofan’s Palace of Sovi‐ accusations of “formalism,” they destabilized the ets in its 1933 rendition, rather than in Ivan work of modernists and helped establish the state’s Zholtovskii’s “classicism” as presented in his 1934 monopoly in architectural discourse and ulti‐ Dom na Mokhovoi (House on Mokhovaia Street) mately architectural forms (p. 16). in Moscow (p. 48).[3] The second chapter focuses on the survival The third chapter further problematizes the strategies and the institutional positions of the monopoly of socialist realist style in Soviet archi‐ leaders of the avant-garde after the 1932 decree on tecture. Here, the author focuses on the construc‐ the dissolution of independent artistic societies. In tion of the Moscow Metropoliten (begun in 1931) architecture, the transition to socialist realism was and the 1937 Soviet pavilion in Paris. Udovički-Selb twofold and especially complicated. As Udovički- considers Alexei Dushkin’s Maiakovskaia metro Selb notes, the international fame of the Soviet station (finished in 1938) an example of the mod‐ state as a hub of progressive architectural thinking ernists’ persistence in realizing their progressive made “the party’s supreme authority ... cater to at ideas contrary to the demands to build “beauti‐ least two audiences—the conservative domestic fully” (krasivo) and “solidly” (prochno). Dushkin’s population (meaning the nomenklatura) and the original project for the metro station, notes the au‐ progressive international intelligentcija” (p. 48).[2] thor, replete with details appropriate to socialist Here, as throughout the book, the author main‐ realist values, differed significantly from the final tains that despite its wide use, the term “socialist result: an innovative lighting system and wittingly realism” was elusive not only to constructivists concealed ventilation system replaced expressive but also to the trendsetters themselves. By analyz‐ murals and the futuristic stainless-steel arches tri‐ ing numerous articles published by architects of umphed over the granite veneering. Here, as in the different artistic inclinations, the author compel‐ case of Ginzburg’s Kislovodsk sanatorium, the au‐ lingly shows how the ambiguity of the term could thor concludes that architects avoided censorship become a reason for criticism in one case and for from the competition committee by first present‐ appreciation in another, depending on how well ing them with a project that answered the needs of socialist realism only to change its forms in the 2 H-Net Reviews process of construction. Udovički-Selb does not go will build for millions more,” they could not be the into the details of or the reasons for such a trans‐ prevalent artistic voice at the congress. The sad formation, but further investigation and research irony of the situation was that the only way Kagan‐ into this architectural strategy would likely yield ovich could counter constructivism was to call for fruitful results. In this chapter, the author, in his at‐ structures that were “literate, simple, and beauti‐ tempt to show that constructivist thought was still ful” (p. 144). Udovički-Selb demonstrates that the viable in the 1930s, expands the geographical area debates about the “creative method” that Soviet of his focus to also consider the construction sites architecture was to adopt continued well into the of peripheral yet growing and strategically import‐ third trimester of 1935, concluding that “notably, ant centers, such as Kuibyshev, Baku, Voronezh, the modernists still maintained a prestige the his‐ Rostov-na-Donu, Sverdlovsk, and Novosibirsk. It is toricists were losing” (p. 151). there, as the author contends, far from the political The fifth chapter analyzes the year of prepara‐ center, that the architects had more freedom and tion for the long-awaited First All-Union Congress opportunities to build in a cosmopolitan manner. of Soviet Architects. Udovički-Selb scrupulously In the fourth chapter, Udovički-Selb continues lists the events leading up to the congress, painting his reevaluation of the creative power dynamics in a strikingly vivid picture of the poisonous atmo‐ Moscow and contends that even after 1932, the sphere and mounting tensions among the archi‐ modernists’ presence in the leading positions of tects. As throughout the book, the fifth chapter the architectural infrastructure was still very demonstrates the powerful position of modernists strong. The author shows that modernists occupied in architecture by analyzing their rigorous resist‐ the editorial board and the pages of the interna‐ ance to vulgar insinuations in the press. The au‐ tionally renowned journal Arkhitektura SSSR (Ar‐ thor contends that while the press (and presum‐ chitecture of the USSR, 1933-92) through the end of ably Kaganovich behind the scenes) was attacking the decade; they also headed half of the twelve “simplism” and “box architecture,” constructivism ARKHPLAN (arkhitekturno-planirovochnye mas‐ was not the only architectural movement that was terskie) workshops, created by Kaganovich. considered “vulgar”: historicist architecture was Through the juxtaposition of the polemics in the also severely attacked for being “bourgeois,” “a pages of Arkhitektura